The Bear(s) minimum

 Bears Fan was looking a bit downcast this morning, more downcast than usual, which will happen when your childhood memories include Bobby Douglass handing off to Ralph Kurek.

"Andy Dalton?!" Bears Fan is saying, upon learning the Bears had acquired Dalton from the Cowboys on a one-year, $10-million deal. "But we wanted Russell Wilson!"

Well, they tried, Bears Fan is told. 

"'Tried?'" Bears Fans sneers, and then channels Yoda: "Do or do not. There is no try!"

But Wilson wasn't leaving Seattle, it turns out. Maybe he found out the Bears were serious.

"Oh, sure! Make fun!" Bears Fan says.

And then looks sad again.

"Why can't we have nice things, like other teams?"

Well ...

Well, because it's the Bears. Getting Russell Wilson would have upset the natural order, because in the natural order, the Bears aren't supposed to have an elite quarterback. They haven't in my lifetime, and I'm 66 years old. I mean, they're the Bears.

So of course they wound up with Andy Dalton.

Andy Dalton is the perfect Bears quarterback, see. He's OK, but not too OK. He had a few more-than-OK stretches with the Bengals -- he's a three-time Pro Bowler, remember -- but he's also had some not-even-OK stretches, and occasionally he was flat-out bad.

He's thrown 218 touchdown passes in 10 seasons, but he's also thrown 126 interceptions. That works out to 12.6 per season. He had eight last year in 11 starts, and he was also sacked 24 times.

Meanwhile, Mitchell Trubisky, the heir apparent Bears quarterback, started 10 games last year after being benched for awhile in mid-season. He threw 16 touchdown passes and eight interceptions. The Bears were 6-3 with him calling the signals.

What the Blob concludes from that is the Bears just paid $10 million for a semi-reliable backup. In other words, they just acquired Nick Foles again, only with flaming red hair. 

Which means Dalton the Magnificent Carrot Top will probably see a fair amount of playing time this season when Matt Nagy inevitably benches Trubisky again.

"You mean this year will be the same as last year?" Bears Fan wails. "But we wanted Russell Wilson!!"

Yeah, well. It's the Bears. You'll have to make do with Virgil Carter.

Or Bob Avellini. Or Gary Huff. Or Peter Tom Willis or Jim Miller or Doug Flutie or ...